February 19, 2013

Early Animations

Chalk board animations bring to mind earlier forms of “motion pictures” such as phenakistiscopes and zoetropes. The phenakistiscope had two spinning disks on a handle that spun in the same direction. A circular card with a series of sequential pictures was attached to one disk and viewed through slots in the second disk while reflected in a mirror. Persistance of motion made the images appear to move. A few years later, the phenakistiscope was replaced by the zoetrope, which more than one person could view at a time and which didn’t require a mirror.